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April 16, 2019

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I'm guessing Mayor Pete had a much bigger head start on this speech than Chasten is indicating.

But as a former political campaign guy, I don't really care at all about who-wrote-the-speech stuff (or the when/how) ...

The main thing that always comes to mind is the use of candidate time. Working on something like this, obviously, is a great use of time. (Obama basically wrote A More Perfect Union by himself, also a good use of time. It saved the campaign vs. Hillary.)

But the "no speechwriter" thing makes me wonder whether Pete is *wasting* a lot of time on things that are way less important, when on most days his non-public-facing hours would be best spent raising money and making personal connections with key individuals/influencers in Iowa (especially) and New Hampshire. Being a political celebrity in those early states doesn't necessarily translate to winning. There's a lot of hard bull-shit work that has to get done in high-touch states.

If he wrote his announcement speech all by himself, that's great! But if he's writing his policy statements on ethanol or remarks for the Nashua Rotary, that's the kind of time suck that leads to a "disappointing fourth-place" in Iowa when your poll #s indicated you should've finished 1 or 2.

Then you get to write a graceful drop-out speech after getting blown out of the water in New Hampshire a week later.

Agree with every paragraph above, Chris.

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